As we approach the release of Apple's Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard), Appleinsider suggests that this may be the last major Mac OS revision that supports the PowerPC architecture.
Looking ahead, those people familiar with Apple development cycles speculate that Mac OS X 10.6 will exclude support for PowerPC-based Macs entirely, requiring that users have one of the company's Intel-based systems which first began making their way to market in early 2006.
Cited as speculation, Apple may not yet have made a decision on this matter. Apple has made no announcements about Mac OS X 10.6. Based on the most recent Mac OS development cycles, Mac OS X 10.6 would not likely ship until 2009.
Apple recently announced that Tim Cook will be stepping down as CEO later this year, after 15 years of leading the company.
Effective September 1, Apple's hardware engineering chief John Ternus will become the company's next CEO, while Cook will become executive chairman of Apple's board of directors. In his new role, Apple said Cook will assist with "certain aspects" of the company,...
Instagram will remove end-to-end encryption for direct messages between users from May 8, 2026. When the date comes around, Meta will potentially be able to see the contents of all messages between users on the social media platform.
Encrypting messages has been an optional feature in Instagram since 2023, but in March of this year the social media platform quietly updated a help page to say ...
Apple is considering dropping the cheapest MacBook Neo configuration as one possible response to the rising cost of building the popular laptop, according to Taiwan-based tech columnist and former Bloomberg reporter Tim Culpan.
The Neo currently starts at $599 for a 256GB model, with a 512GB version at $699.
Writing in his latest Culpium newsletter, Culpan says cutting the entry-level...
...and only fundamental difference between G4 and G5 is 32/64 bitness. It would make sense to only support G5 or not support PPC at all if the next big cat (10.6) would be 64-bit only — but WHY ON EARTH would they make it 64-bit only as they now tout the wonderful feature of letting 32bit and 64bit hardware live nicely together under the same roof? No, that's not going to happen.
They won't do that. There are a lot of Intel based Minis, MacBooks, MBPs and iMacs that don't have 64 bit CPUs. The Mini got the C2D only 2 months ago. When 10.6 comes out in 2009, they won't exclude systems that are only two years old.
manufacturers of processor upgrades. There are still a few out there, cranking out PPC G3 and G4s. They might eventuallly get some G5s, but that's doubtful.
If PPC support is dumped, and I don't doubt that it will be, it's just a question of when, they're going to lose a major part of their business. It's time to diversify!:eek:
Once this news gets out, expect lower prices on eBay for PPC macs :-)
By late 2009, it would have been 4 years since the last new PPC mac was sold.
Not so; new PPC Macs were still being sold at least as late as August 2006, when the Mac Pro was introduced. Plenty of 17" and 12" PowerBooks and iBooks were also sold in '06, too, to say nothing of the XServes, which remained G5s until less than a year ago.
In any event, since Tiger will have been out for 2.5 years when Leopard ships (assuming it's still on time, as now appears the case), shouldn't we be expecting Cougar (or whatever) to be coming around April 2010 at the earliest?
